Isis Pharma soars on cholesterol-drug data

Analyst lauds 'potentially powerful' therapy

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Isis Pharmaceuticals Inc. shares ended Monday with a nearly 20% rise on clinical-trial results that showed one of its drug candidates was safe and effective at fighting so-called "bad" cholesterol.

The Carlsbad, Calif.-based company
ISIS
which presented data from two Phase II studies on Sunday at the American Heart Association's meeting in Chicago, said ISIS 301012 "significantly reduces" LDL, or bad, cholesterol. The data also showed that the drug had a "strong safety profile," and it was well-tolerated in both studies.

Shares of Isis closed at $12.43, up $2.05, after touching a three-and-a-half year high of $14 earlier in the session.

"The robustness of the data is encouraging," Needham & Co. analyst Mark Monane wrote in a note to clients. "We believe these data to date show that ISIS 301012 warrants continuous development as a potentially powerful new addition to therapies for cholesterol reduction."

In the first study reported, patients with high cholesterol on stable doses of statins were treated with ISIS 301012 for five weeks. Patients who received 300 milligrams a week of ISIS 301012 in this study achieved a 51% reduction in LDL cholesterol, a 42% reduction in total cholesterol, and a 41% reduction in triglycerides beyond the levels achieved with statins alone.

Isis also presented new results from an ongoing study in which high-cholesterol patients were treated for three months with 300 mg a week of ISIS 301012 as a single agent.

In this study, Isis said that increasing the dose of ISIS 301012 to 300 mg a week from 200 mg a week further reduced atherogenic lipids, with improvements in LDL cholesterol, total cholesterol and triglycerides of 62%, 46% and 43%, respectively.

"In short, the data were very positive," A.G. Edwards analyst Aaron Reames wrote in a research note.

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